When to Plant Romaine lettuce in De Witt, IA

The USDA Zone info is a great tool for gardeners to help us estimate your gardening schedule. The zone info helps tell us things like average date of last frost and lowest expected temperature for your area.

You should be able to figure out when it's a good idea to plant romaine lettuce by looking at the USDA zone info for De Witt.


Planting Calendar for Romaine lettuce

Frost tolerance for romaine lettuce: Very tolerant of frost.
When to plant: Up to 7 weeks before last frost.

Since romaine lettuce are one of those plants that can tolerate quite a bit of cold weather you can plant them much earlier in the year than more sensitive plants.

JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
Legend 
A good time to plant romaine lettuce
Possibly ok, but a risky time to plant romaine lettuce
Probably not a good time to plant romaine lettuce

The earliest that you can plant romaine lettuce in De Witt is February. However, you really should wait until March if you don't want to take any chances.

The last month that you can plant romaine lettuce and expect a good harvest is probably September. You probably don't want to wait any later than that or else your romaine lettuce may not have a chance to really do well. If you are starting your romaine lettuce indoors then you might be able to get away with starting them a little bit earlier.

Last Frost Date

In De Witt the average date of last frost happens on April 15. You can expect an average low temperature of -20°F in the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for De Witt may not be accurate from year to year the actual date of last frost will vary from year to year. Half of the time in De Witt you get surprised by a frost after April 15 so make sure that you are prepared to protect your romaine lettuce if you have a surprise late frost.

USDA Zone Info for De Witt

Here is the info for USDA Zone 5a.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)April 15
Average Date of First Frost (fall)October 15
Lowest Expected Low-20°F
Highest Expected Low-15°F

This means that on a really cold year, the coldest it will get is -20°F. On most years you should be prepared to experience lows near -15°F.

Plants to Grow in De Witt

You may be interested in your other planting guides for De Witt.